First, I must admit that I did indeed steal green tomatoes from my neighbor’s yard on Wednesday and send them home to my mother. They were on my side of the fence, and she needed them I assure you. Perhaps I’ll go to hell, but at least it will be for a good reason.

I seem to be punished for it. I have had an evil return of the acid reflux problems—burping and acid and boiling. I can’t figure out what I’ve changed greatly about my eating. I promise that I didn’t eat any of those tomatoes. Both of them went to Virginia. All I can think of is that I was perhaps eating regular meals while my sister was in town, and my schedule is all wacky again now that she’s gone. I also remember trying a tropical punch Fuze Tuesday night. It contained some pineapple juice and turned out to be a bad idea; but could it have caused all this? It doesn’t feel good, and I am really quite unpleasant to be around. Good thing I don’t have friends around to listen to this horror.

Yesterday, I went to Pages for All Ages, the local indy bookstore, to take advantage of my birthday discount. I got two YA books that dabble in multimodal kinds of writing in some way:

• i can’t tell you by Hillary Frank is a multigenre novel that consists of a range of notes that the protagonist, Jake, writes—including e-mail messages, notes on dry-erase boards, napkins, tablecloths, and even upside-down calculator messages.
• Confessions of a Boyfriend Stealer [A Blog] by Robynn Clairday combines blog entries and message boards with connecting narrative to tell how the blog author, Genesis Bell, loses her two best friends.

I also bought Coraline by Neil Gaiman. I’ve always thought that the book looked freaky and wasn’t interested in reading it as a result. Lisa got a copy along with a huge pile of books for a graphic novel project we’re working on. Sharon said that she and her son liked the book, and there was a Terry Pratchett quotation on the back. So I decided that maybe I should try not to look at the pictures and read it anyway. Maybe if I put it in that cloth paperback book cover I have… We’ll see.

All this is sort of silly. I have 21 books on the table that I need to write reviews of for my other site, and I have 13 books lying there that I haven’t read yet. 15 books if you count the books in the Bromeliad Triology separately. Just noticed that the next book in the Johnny Maxwell trilogy is due out in January. I’m not sure about buying it though. Book one seemed somewhat pushed and obvious. Fortunately, I have months to decide.

Cleaning the old notebook

I’m in the process of starting a new notebook for work, which means that I have to go through and copy over the info that I need to keep. These are assorted things that I found in the process and wanted to save for whatever reason. If you’re not entertained by the list, try the Bush Speechmaker instead.

• “Teaching you how to rest and teach you how to achieve a sense of proportion.”
• “It’s easier to leave than be left behind.”
• multimodal literacies. what tools count for whom, for what purposes. how children & adults interpret, navigate, and produce meaning about themselves and others w/ digital multimodal text.
• Sausage Bacon Bites
  Line dish with foil. Cut bacon in thirds. Wrap around little smokies. Smother in brown sugar. Bake at 400 degrees for 20-25 minutes.

So that’s how today started. Every machine I touched crashed. I never really did get anything concrete done. Had a few meetings. Crashed machines. Talked to IT folks about crashed machines. Finally gave up and came home early. I’m sure it’s all related to the fact that Snuffles has gone home to Virginia :(

So the weeping began about 11 AM, when my sister and Snuffles the poodle loaded into the car and started the trek back to Virginia.

My house is very empty, and there is no one at my back door. :(

Just a pic of The Mystery Machine for Beastie, the world’s best lover of Scooby Snacks.

Error! Error!

Whoever came up with this obviously got something wrong…

Today’s Horoscope
Whoever said that it’s impossible to have it all clearly never met you. As one of the most can-do signs in the zodiac, you’re able to set your sights on a goal and get there. Your trick? You never let yourself get overwhelmed.

Herewith are assorted poodle pictures. When there’s a poodle in the house, you have to do what the poodle wants you to do. It doesn’t matter if you had plans of your own. Poodles decide for you. Mostly, they apparently want to have their ears rubbed and for you to give them whatever it is that you are eating.

I’ve also snuck in a picture of my new USB lava lamp :) A birthday present from my sister and niece and nephew.

Today we did get some things done in spite of poodle interruptions. Most importantly, I got a new chair to sit on at the desk. My old one was (1) dirty and resisting cleaning, and (2) no longer letting me adjust it. It had one height setting, the lowest one. This new one seems to have better back support, though it doesn’t tilt back like the old one. I think it will work however, and it wasn’t very expensive.

We also got some pillows and such stuff to try to adjust my bed further. I’m supposed to be sleeping with the head of the bed raised 8 inches because of the acid reflux. I’ve put wedge pillows between the mattress and box springs. That seems to be working, but my sister is going to help me put some non-slip padding between the two so that the wedge pillows quit sliding the bed down. Going to try to fit the pillows in better and make things more stable. The pillows made all the difference for my sleeping without problems, so I need a more permanent solution.

I did actually open a lesson plan today, but I never got anything done on it. I blame the poodle.

Despite the fact that I just got flowers last week for Stanley’s memorial, my mom sent flowers and a stuffed teddy today for my birthday. :)

My sister and one of her poodles, Snuffles, have arrived for a birthday visit. I’ve been older for an hour and two minutes. Snuffles, named after Sirius Black’s alias, is shown here attempting to camouflage into the couch.

He keeps checking me out in the living room, even though Kerri is in bed. You can never tell when I might get out a steak or open the doggie treats. Earlier this evening, he was outside chasing bugs. I’m not sure what he planned to do with them when he caught them.

On a work note, I sent out the ReadWriteThink content report, listing the latest three lessons. We now have 11 of our 60 needed for the year. I’m editing one on the Holocaust, and I’m writing one of my own on Reading and Writing in the Digital Age, which asks students to widen their definition of “text.”

Also learned that the member price for my Kit will be $47.95. That seems like a good price for the packet of info. It could easily be a course packet for a grad class or methods class, so it seems about right to me. We’ll see what happens when it hits the online store later this month. Reviews aren’t back from the reviewers, so I guess I get to spend the weekend goofin’ off rather than revising. I’m taking Friday and Monday off to be with my sister. :)

“Google Lets Surfers Sift Through Blogs” from The Washington Post

Apparently Google wasn’t searching enough things so now they’re searching blogs too. Of course, you could find blogs in the regular search. I’m guessing the idea is that they help you limit the hits that are returned. I’d just like to know how they’re defining a blog and whether they’re going to be able to filter out the spam blogs (splogs).